Southern Comforts. JoAnn Ross

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      Although she was as beautiful as ever, Cash thought Chelsea looked tired. And if she’d chosen those obviously expensive sedate clothes to appear older and more sophisticated, she’d failed. Because the subdued colors only called attention to the gleaming copper penny hue of her long straight hair.

      Her bright eyes—the color of new money—were wide and warm; her mouth smiled easily. The way she answered Charlie’s questions with brief, but thoughtful answers, revealed she’d matured. She’d also revealed a vulnerable, intelligent side of Melanie that even Cash, who prided himself on being able to read women, hadn’t discovered.

      “I didn’t know you had a degree in economics from Johns Hopkins.”

      “When I first started out in Hollywood, being smart wasn’t sexy.” Melanie didn’t take her eyes from the screen. “Hush. I want to hear what she’s saying.”

      So did he. Chelsea Cassidy’s voice was still as smooth as heated honey. He could have listened to it all morning.

      All too soon, the interview was over. When Cash found himself wishing they’d thought to tape it, so he could listen to those dulcet tones again, he decided that lack of sleep and too much champagne at last night’s wrap party for Melanie’s film must have killed off a few too many brain cells.

      “Well, what did you think?”

      “She was pretty good.”

      She hadn’t known him long, but her next words proved that she’d come to know him well. “Christ, Cash, trust your hormones to leap to attention at the sight of a beautiful woman. I was talking about what Chelsea Cassidy had to say. About me.”

      It was not Cash’s style to ignore one woman for another. Since he’d first lost his virginity in an upstairs bedroom of Fancy Porter’s whorehouse, Cash had prided himself on being an attentive, thoughtful lover. Fancy had taught him a lot of things that long hot summer of his fifteenth year. But the two most valuable lessons had been that a slow hand was worth a dozen quick fucks and treating a woman as if she were the only female in the world invariably paid off big time.

      Concentrating on the woman who’d warmed his bed so well and so often these past weeks, Cash pulled Melanie closer. “You’re a lot better than damn good, sugar.”

      “Well, I know that.” She pouted prettily and brushed some dark hair back from his forehead. “And, by the way, I think Chelsea is married. Or, if not married, seriously involved. While we were doing the interview, she got a call from some guy she was living with. Nelson somebody.”

      So she’d actually gone and done it, Cash thought with a burst of cold, angry derision. She’d actually married that arrogant, pompous jerk.

      “Not that I imagine a little detail like marriage vows would much matter to you,” Melanie said.

      “I never sleep with married women.”

      It was true. These days, anyway. Well, almost true, Cash amended as Lilabeth Yarborough came to mind. But hell, Lilabeth’s husband had left the former high school cheerleader and their three kids to seek his fortune on the NASCAR racing circuit, and although they’d never actually gotten around to signing the papers to make the divorce legal, Billy Yarborough hadn’t been back to Raintree for two and a half years.

      “Besides, why would I want her?” He nibbled seductively at Melanie’s earlobe. “When I have you?”

      “Damn. I don’t know what’s wrong with my mind today.” She was out of bed again like a rocket, scooping up last night’s discarded clothes which made a path from the doorway to the bed. “I’m sorry, Cash. But I’m booked on the ten-thirty flight back to L.A.”

      Cash drove her the thirty miles into Savannah. After watching her disappear down the jetway he stopped at a newsstand in the terminal and bought a copy of Vanity Fair.

      Over the intervening years, he’d managed to convince himself that those crazy six months with Chelsea had been nothing more than a particularly virulent attack of lust. He’d gotten over it. And her. He survived the uptown Yankee girl in the same way he might have survived some rare fever that having run its course, never returned.

      As he sat in his Ferrari in the terminal parking lot, flipping through the glossy magazine to the article, Cash assured himself that he was only moderately interested in seeing if Chelsea had turned into as good a writer as she was a talker.

      He hadn’t bought the magazine because he was interested in her personally. Because he wasn’t.

      Not even a little bit.

      The hell he wasn’t.

      Casa Grande, Arizona

      In a Motel 6 off Interstate 10, George Waggoner lay in bed, drinking from a can of Budweiser in an attempt to take the edge off the blinding hangover he was suffering.

      Since the cut-rate motel didn’t feature dirty cable movies, he’d been forced to settle for network fare. As he made his way through the six-pack, he was only vaguely aware of the early morning newscast. He’d been in this motel room for most of the six weeks since his release from prison.

      The money he’d managed to stash away during seven years in the pen was almost gone, eaten up by rent, cigarettes, booze and the occasional hooker. It was time to come up with a new plan.

      Which was difficult to do when his eyes felt as if they were bleeding and some shitass maniac was breaking rocks inside his head.

      And then he saw her.

      George blinked and rubbed his hand over his aching eyes, at first thinking she was some sort of hallucination left over from last night’s binge. Like those bats in The Lost Weekend he’d watched on late-night television.

      But no. The image flickering on the snowy television picture was unmistakable. Oh, she’d changed her hair. Her clothes may not be Kmart blue light specials anymore and her accent was a helluva lot more fluid than he remembered. But having known her intimately, George wasn’t fooled. Not one damn bit.

      “Roxanne Scarbrough.” He barked a tobacco-roughened laugh as he watched her pour some unpronounceable French liqueur into a white bowl. “Where the hell did she come up with a name like that?”

      Tossing back the rest of the beer, he climbed out of the too soft bed, retrieved his unwashed jeans from the floor, and yanked them on over his briefs. A black

      Harley-Davidson T-shirt followed. Then his boots.

      Since the motel wasn’t the kind to put out fancy writing paper for its guests, he went next door to the 7-Eleven, bought a tablet, a package of envelopes, a stamp and another six-pack. Then, on impulse, having already decided that his luck had just taken a decided turn for the better, he spent ten bucks on Powerball lotto tickets.

      Not that he needed them, George told himself as he walked back to his single room. Because, hot damn if he hadn’t just hit his own personal jackpot!

      He opened the tablet to the first page and began to write.

      “Dear Cora Mae...”

      Chapter Two

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